


Ouroboros Inc.

by fundamentalBlue



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Non-Magical, Dubious Consent, F/M, Manipulative Relationship, tomione - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-02-22
Updated: 2018-02-22
Packaged: 2019-03-22 15:05:55
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,289
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13766700
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fundamentalBlue/pseuds/fundamentalBlue
Summary: Hermione is a dedicated conservationist, hell bent on doing whatever it takes to stop urban development on protected land. Tom Riddle gets his thrills crushing the opposition and climbing ever higher in the corporate ranks.





	Ouroboros Inc.

**Author's Note:**

> Could probably use a full time beta. Thanks Kyoki777 and Katsitting for looking over this.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A party and a proposition.

“Harry! Harry, the bloody shoes.” Her best friend, co-worker and every-day hero was rushing towards the open door of the UberBLACK, a pair of Ginny’s Louboutins held in outstretched hands. Hiking up the gown, she shoved her bare feet out and wiggled her toes at him.

A truly good husband to her red haired friend, he didn’t hesitate to take each foot in hand, brushing off debri from the bottom of her feet from when she’d run to the car before securing each heel to her. He helped tuck her legs into the back seat, arm carefully lifting the $800 dollar rented dress for the event so it wouldn’t rip. Years of Harry taking Ginny to fundraisers were paying dividends for Hermione tonight. 

“Hermione, I know we’ve already argued about this, so I won’t bring it up again. But be careful, ok?” His eyes were field-green, and he often used them to great effect in securing funding for their non-profit conservation company, _Phoenix_. She thought she’d be resistant by now to being pinioned by them, but Harry’s earnest vulnerability was a force of nature that tugged at heartstrings as a matter of course.

“I will. I will find out who is behind the project, and if it’s the right moment, I’ll find out what land they’re looking for. We’ll get ahead of this development, we will.”

“And if it’s Grindelwald, you _leave,_ like, yesterday.”

“Yes, yes, I’ve had to shake that slimey git’s hand before, I know what a soul-sucking fiend the man is.” She said lowly, which didn’t make Harry feel secure at all. 

“Hermione.” He whinged, not unpleasantly.

The CEO of _Ouroboros_ Inc., one Gellert Grindelwald, was a man that was so far up the food chain that his numerous but preposterously quiet scandals had their own scandals, like a cancer that was infectious. Everything he stuck his fingers into oozed corruption, back-door dealings. and the kind of radio silence that was unnatural for how much he was in the public eye.

“I have to go, I’ll text you when I’m there and when I leave.” Her friend gave her one last pout and stare, nodding to her as he closed the door to the sleek Tesla she somehow managed to wrangle for this event. It only cost her about a hundred in surge pricing. She wanted to wince, but the ruddy thing was an investment. As was the Marchesa Notte, black off the shoulder gown she had rented for another hundred.   
  
The soft but sturdy fabric fit so well, that it made her feel almost slightly ashamed of the pair of Hanes knickers she wore underneath.   
  
She pushed that thought aside.

Confidence was key to victory. She would act as though she belonged.

Tonight was about Hogsmeade, and the rare Thestral flowers that lay unprotected in the tiny _Forbidden Forest_ valley that sat near to the town.

It had started with contractors, as it always did. Large trucks with deep tire tracks dotting the land that was, as far as they had known, preserved for the public. Whatever Hermione had thought that working for a non-profit would be, it was nothing like she imagined. Some of the time she was a detective or a soldier bent on preventing enemy infiltration. They took pictures of surveyors, set out their own motion detecting cameras to determine when they showed up, and scrambled to prepare filings for injunctions against the state releasing the land for development. She followed unmarked cars when she could, approached workers as though she were a curious citizen, when she was really gathering ammunition. 

Then there was the paperwork. She’d thought that law school at Cambridge would have prepared her for the filthy, underhanded tactics of corporations; she’d thought wrong.   
  
Lastly, were the fundraisers, which, after she’d cold-shouldered a minister of some department or other because he’d drained an entire marsh for more land at his vacation home, Harry had taken her kindly by the hand and told her that he and his tennis star wife would handle the endless banquets and _falsities._

It’d been some years since she’d been watching this game, however. At least two years of denial that the game was even necessary, and one year of debate as to whether she should bite the bullet and involve herself. It took her breakup with Ron to clarify matters for her; in a fit of pique, he had told her that she was handicapped by her pride. Hermione couldn’t get what she wanted because she wouldn’t take what was offered. She always wanted things on her terms or nothing at all.

She’d been stunned to realize that the man was right. Worse, he was part of the problem, and even he knew it. The lackluster clothing that earned her no respect outside of the boundaries of the _Phoenix_ was something she had considered a badge of honor. The late work nights were integral to how she saw her own self-worth. Eating takeout food or not eating at all was a snub in the face of the rich and powerful donors who waxed profound on the benefits of the Paleo diet while tearing up virgin forests and despoiling rivers at unprecedented rates.  

She knew in her heart it was wrong to feel like Ron was as responsible for her state of being as she was. The man was easy-going and loved without reservation. And she thought that was what she needed, to have won out over Ron’s ex, Lavender, and find herself ensconced in the boisterous and happy Weasley family with Harry at their side. Sometimes she wished Ron wouldn’t just complain half-heartedly, but that he’d put his foot down. Stand up for himself against her.

She saw herself becoming Molly to Arthur, Ron’s parents, and the discomfort of that reality had driven a wedge between them. It wasn’t Ron’s fault, and she placed no blame on him consciously. Yet these feelings wouldn’t reconcile themselves, and so only a few months ago she had cut Ron loose, embarrassed at her own cruel thoughts against the man.   
  
Those events in her personal life were what had led her here, to the annual Yule party of _Ouroboros_ Inc. While it wasn’t a public event, invitations were handed out to factions of government and, in an almost snide manner, to the very charities and non-profits that sought to thwart the company at every turn. Nestled in her purse, was one such invitation that had been issued to Dumbledore at _Phoenix_ , a ‘fuck-you’ after _Ouroboros_ had successfully began development on a section of the popular hiking destination, _Diagon Alley_.

 _Phoenix_ had tried to prove, unsuccessfully, that the Nargle vine found there was a distinct subspecies, deserving of protection outside of the usual conservation laws. Luna, their resident expert on local fauna and flora, was rightfully devastated.   
  
The appeal had already been filed, but there was no injunction stopping _Ouroboros_ from developing the land. They’d broken ground on a series of high-end condos that summer, and men with flamethrowers had deliberately burned all of the vines found near the build site. Because, of course, the roots could interfere with the laying of foundation. The sinister underbelly of the plot was that if there were no vines, then the appeal lost a great deal of its value.

Hermione ground her teeth thinking of whatever arsehole had thought up such a cruel and awful thing to do.

She wouldn’t let them do the same to Hogsmeade and its Thestrals.

When the car pulled up to Malfoy Manor, she steeled herself at the sheer opulence of the place. Immaculately trimmed bushes were back lit with soft white lights, and fountains made of what was surely marble dotted the front lawn in stately symmetry. The manor was a prodigy house if she’d ever seen one, with its decorated skyline and exuberant turrets peeking out of the darkness.  

  
Such was the inherent wealth of the Malfoy name, and she could bet they loved their pretentious heap of stones more than the lives of their constituents. It was a gross ecosystem that encouraged people like Lucius Malfoy to hold office. One could say his son, who she had the misfortune of graduating law school with, hadn’t fallen far from the tree. If he’d fallen at all, given the sheer amount of inbreeding that must have gone into maintaining the same narrow features and white-blond hair the Malfoys had always had.  

“Ma’am,” the tuxedo clad butler reflexively opened the door and had a hand extended to hers _almost_ before she could school her countenance into something like a cool disdain, instead of looking like the irritated but gawking tourist she was.

Ginny had warned her, that the butlers were the first line of defense for these events. As the man’s eyes dragged over her appearance, baldly assessing, she could see him noting the expensive and almost garish necklace that Harry had lent her from his parent’s vault. It was the coup de grace of her deception. The plebs couldn’t afford baubles of this size, after all.

Imitating and exuding the hollow manner of a Cambridge lady, she left the car and the butler behind, shawl collected about her shoulders. It was pure silk, the velvet a pile on pile baroque design in pure black. Another item of Ginny’s the woman had lended for this endeavor.   
  
Brandishing the invitation, she strolled the long and lonely walk to the well-lit veranda. She could hear glasses tinkling and the raucous laughter of someone’s champagne addled wife behind the large double doors.   
  
“Ms. Hermione Granger.” She all but sneered at the doorman as she spoke, channeling every aristocrat who’d ever looked down the length of their nose at her.

  
She stared straight ahead into the world of people that she’d been surrounded with for her entire time at Cambridge. People she’d sworn she’d leave behind after, only to find that they occupied almost all the positions of meaning in her line of work.

Charity was for _wives._

Advocacy was for young, urban professionals who would be forever lined up outside the mullion windows, outside, looking in.

It made her smile, to think of piercing this veil, and she strode forward after surrendering her shawl and clutch to the hands of a servant.

  
The atrium was as beautiful as she had expected, and even the paunchy old men in perfectly tailored suits did nothing to dim the majesty of the building and the scene. She wanted it to feel extravagant, excessive. Instead its elegance had a rightness that defied her supposition about what upper crust parties were. What she really wanted, was to think that all of this effort had been a waste, instead of a joyous celebration of accomplishment and success.

Harry had often joked that country clubs had atrocious food; and that was true, but this stood outside the bounds. That fundraisers had the most terrible hors d'oeuvres imaginable, that the champagne was cheap, and how base these gatherings could be.    
  
As carbon copy servers with long serving aprons swept through the crowd with flutes and blinis with caviar, _yes actual caviar and not plain fish eggs,_ she gaped for a moment. A sixty-something woman who was clinging to the last vestiges of her youth caught her eye and she closed her mouth just as abruptly, while the woman all but glowered, if the botox in her face would have allowed facial expressions.

“Granger?” The voice was incredulous and had a hint of poisonous disdain. Of all the dumb luck, the one person she had planned, hoped, prayed she’d dodge was behind her. She turned around, keeping her body stiff and posture taut.

“Malfoy. A _pleasure_ to see you again.” The bully that Draco was, he snatched the hand she had outstretched and squeezed the bones of her fingers harshly as he kissed her knuckles. Hands that had punched his poncy face when he had almost successfully gotten one of her sorority sister’s cat put down after the thing bit him the morning after a rager at their house.  

The entire upstairs had woken up to a high pitched shriek that they were sure was one of their own. Draco had hurried past the open doors, clutching his hand and clothing together as he did a walk of shame down and out the door.   
  
She smiled in the present, remembering, and it probably looked like an all too knowing sneer to Draco, who could be sure she was cherishing that memory every time she saw him. It felt like the same face she wore when animal control had come to the door with Draco in tow, and she had succinctly stated ‘ _what cat?’_ He’d never gotten over how quickly she’d out-maneuvered him, sending the cat to her owner’s parents on a plane with Harry’s uncle Sirius, who worked as a pilot.

  
Draco’s face was a brittle mask, and underneath she could see he wanted to spit out something suitably crude to her.

“Yes, a pleasure. I’d be _delighted_ to escort you over to whoever had the fortune of bringing you this evening. You did arrive with someone, yes?” The tiniest of smirks curved his lips, the man full well knowing she had come in here alone and how even in this enlightened time and place, it was a faux pas to be bereft of male escort. The snide undertone of how the only way she’d find herself here was if she’d been invited by someone superior to herself didn’t go over her head either.   
  
“Yes.” She bit out carefully, before the implications of lying could catch up with her. “But I wouldn’t want to put Astoria out by monopolizing your time.”  

“Nonsense.” Eying his extended elbow, she looked back up at him before giving the lamest excuse in the book. 

“I’ll make sure to introduce you after I use the powder room.” She said tightly, and tried not to teeter on her heels as she slipped into the crowd and away from Draco Malfoy.

 

\---Tom---------------

 

Marriage.

Of all the institutions that existed and could bar him from the things he wanted, no, deserved, it would be the most useless and sentimental of them. It was all that stood guarding what was _his_ by right of ability and accomplishments.

He watched Gellert shake the hands of the sycophants and deep-pocketed patrons who he dispensed fragments of power to as though they were gifts instead of hooks. Beside him his unreasonably cheerful wife, who was of questionable mental efficiency, smiled and shook the hands her husband had cast off, cradling each of them like the sad little treasures she believed their homage to her husband to be.  
  
That Gellert Grindelwald was gay seemed irrelevant.

Five years under the famous CEO and founder of _Ouroboros,_ and his transcendence was determined by something as mundane as where he was presumed to wet his dick.

It was fortunate that he excelled at amoral words and deeds, as a man in his position should. Tom was under no delusions that he was the villain of many stories in this city and that even still others would romanticize the notion he had a heart of gold underneath, or at least a code of conduct. That’d he’d cross every line but _that_ one or _this_ one.  

Fools.

There wasn’t such a thing as lines and evil. Only power and those too weak to seek it.

Yet there was this problem of his persistent singleness, that would have been easily resolved if he was an ethical sort of a person. And from that, evolved a conundrum of his own making. 

He’d noticed some time back that he needed a partner, a woman, to proceed any further in the company, as well as political venues such as this one. It had been before a word was ever said to him directly on the matter; Tom’s powers of observation weren’t limited solely to his occupation. He had crafted his life carefully, counting out the pieces he added and cut from himself in a miserly fashion until he felt sleek with dominance over he who was Tom Riddle. And was such a fine management of his own agency, that in comparison, others moved through life as though in a fog.

His deviance from the norm started with a small lie about having a date, which in reality had been a clandestine meetup with his affianced lover, but not to him, Bellatrix. A follow up question on how the date had gone was answered in a positive affirmative offhandedly, and from there, he’d allowed the fact that he had a girlfriend niggle its way into the office gossip and dynamic.

It wasn’t as if he hadn’t known there would be consequences, that he would have to produce said imaginary woman at some point. He had believed that it wouldn’t have been so soon as the Yule party for the corporation. But Gellert had sat him down a week before and discussed frankly that Tom’s future in this company as being contingent on his appearance as a wholesome and upstanding member of society. This included a wife, 1.5 children, a full staff and a charming manse in the countryside. Grindelwald was under the impression that any replacement of his should and would suffer the same restrictions and trappings he had undergone so many years ago.   
  
He didn’t think that Gellert would have encouraged him to find ‘love’ for its own sake, and not be subsumed by such mundanities as societal mores. More, he thought the man would resent what had been forced onto him, so much that Tom would be spared the same upheaval of his perfectly organized life into the contract of marriage.

Tom had only just been able to lie convincingly to Gellert that the mysterious ‘she’ would possibly be able to make it later in the evening to the party, as she was busy watching a relative’s children and had already committed to doing so months before. It had been stretching it to say so, and Tom knew that the next time, he would have to have someone stand in as his partner lest Gellert suspect. Declaring that they had broken up would only buy him so much time, as he’d have to start all over with the same premise.  
  
Actually dating someone as the rest of the hacks in his office did, was a process too sloppy and inexact for him to participate in. Better that the role of his ‘wife’ were cut and dry, clean and controlled.

Could he rent an escort for this role? Likely not. Too many of his contemporaries frequented such women to risk it. And there weren’t exactly long-term acting positions for people to behave as though they were a life-partner.

The solution to all of this wasn’t immediately apparent to him. 

Still, he didn’t despair.

He was Tom Riddle, inheritor of his mother’s noble estate and titles. Also given begrudging acknowledgement of his existence by his father’s family after a nasty exchange of letters and DNA tests. It was true that he hadn’t solely created his own success, but he had wrenched his rightful distinctions from the grave after he had left the orphanage, and had used them to manipulate his father into a quivering submission. And he did so appreciate what it felt like to have others, especially a person who represented what would have been an authority in his life, under his thumb.   
  
He disliked his surname’s outward implications of Tom belonging to a _family_ , an almost useless gift from his father. But it was sweet, oh so sweet, to continue to bear the name ‘Riddle’ as a memorial of his father’s shame as a parent. Shame for having impregnated the last nobly born woman of the Gaunt line out of wedlock. Shame for abandoning her to die and him to obscurity. Shame for not looking for his own son. Tom Riddle Sr.’s reputation had sunk blessedly low in the world after the reveal of Tom Jr.’s origins.

Yes, the entire situation was better than the murder he’d contemplated committing. The death of their good name was a fall that would last forever.   
  
Much like the true nature of his birth, an opportunity would present itself to Tom regarding a partner. And he supposed if it didn’t, he’d find someone to blackmail into agreeing to stand with him until he could properly vet a candidate for marriage. What he didn’t want, was to be considered single at all. A seamless transition from lie to something more truthful was preferable to being single and under the man’s speculative eye once more.

Marriage.   
  
Distasteful thing.   
  
A reciprocation and a symmetry of two beings that was discordant to Tom in every way.

Tom wasn’t unaware of his own psychology. Born into an environment designed to crush all hope, he had carved and cut and bled his way into authority. What he wanted, he took. If it was given, it wasn’t worth having. And this is why he found himself in _Ouroboros_ , where the thrill of crushing the opposition was plentiful enough to feed his dark urges and the cruelties he could enact nuanced enough to allow him to believe he wasn’t one of the many banal evils lapping at the teat of indifference and incapability.   
  
He smote them, like a God. And in the way of an Old Testament spirit, he was vengeful and precise. It wasn’t enough to slit a throat; the knife must be seen. His work appreciated.   
  
These non-profits with their boundless, sickening _hope_ that the next time would be better, that they could win against the monolithic machine of progress, well, pressing them down had been the one thing he’d found in this world that was a veritable wellspring of satisfaction. Even Bellatrix, her eyes glassy with pain and pupils blown wide, didn’t compare.   
  
She now stood next to Rodolphus Lestrange, a man who, though a cuckhold, was a self-aware one. The pair was mismatched. A thoroughbred and a clydesdale attempting to pull a single cart. Bella claimed to love Tom’s sadism, but what the woman loved was pain, not suffering, withholding, surrender, control, and finally, ownership. And Tom could think of very few things that would invoke torment in the woman more than this current arrangement with Lestrange. She was an ambitious woman with no ambitions, a vicious dog on a leash of her own devising convinced that she was running free. Tom had simply chosen not to alleviate her obvious predicament by marrying her. Watching her clench and wither in her marital bonds was good, _better_ than seeing her in the many depraved positions she delighted in taking.   
  
He believed that there were subtler, drawn out feasts to be had than the instant gratification of the physical.

Tom drifted, naming faces in the crowd to stay engaged. Later, when the more important persons were flush with drink, he would approach and begin the dance. For now, he liked to watch and bide his time.

He found himself in the hall nearest the bathrooms where the most intoxicated of the guests scurried in and out at this early hour.

One such guest was anything but loose with spirits, yet she skittered past him on designer heels that she was woefully unpracticed in. As she passed by, distress written in every limb of her body, he was able to put name to face.   
  
Hermione Granger.

Dumbledore’s dowdy little lickspittle solicitor and, it was rumored, often the driving force behind a great many appeals that had been filed against _Ouroboros_. Their courtroom barrister was the stiff-backed Percy Weasley, and as exacting as the man was, his skill didn’t lay in dredging up obscure and tenuous laws or precedents.

Tom made it a point to learn as much as he could about the opposition, and her face had floated up from the recesses of his memories on the _Diagon Alley_ development. Sometimes when he finished with a case, he would page through the images, imagining what each smiling face thought of the things he’d done. In his mind’s eye he could see them lick the wounds he inflicted, and he imagined them going on living, a little less bright.   
  
His attraction to her distrust of this place, her obvious fear, was immediate. Not to her body, though it was a perfectly tidy vessel, but the obvious determination in the face of some invisible adversity that hung around her like a miasma. A do-gooder. The girl who signed every petition to save the fill-in-the-blank in university. Poor middle class scholarship-scheme girl, made petulant with trying to be as good as everyone else while she pretended she didn’t care about such things at all.   
  
He’d heard Lucius’s boy go on about the swot often enough. How if Draco were a VP, he’d do his damndest to hem her in using profanities about her class, her sex, her looks. All the things that would work to destabilize a woman such as Granger for a split second, until they didn’t. His notes said that she was a cheap dresser, with ill-fitted office wear picked up in some outlet or thrift store. The woman before him tonight had taken care in her appearance, and having done so she was sufficiently presentable. Again, she was the kind who liked to believe she didn’t give a shit and dressed indifferently to prove it, but to call her ugly was a misidentification. A distinction that this Hermione Granger was at least vaguely aware of enough to both ignore the attentions of persons like Draco and continue to dress as she please, and to not be a slouch when she wanted.

With Lucius angling for a puppet to replace Grindelwald upon the man’s retirement, a malleable one that he held, Tom didn’t require more than a second to decide that he would bring this scrummer into his orbit. He would have Lucius’ shite child whinging to his father over it and perhaps there’d be a bit of fun in finding out more about Dumbledore’s little operation. He’d been meaning to do a deep dive into their practices anyway after _Diagon._   
  
He waited, body angled just barely away from the door and to the left, so that when she teetered out of the powder room, he would meander sideways while facing the ball room, and topple her over. It was a cheap trick, but invasion of physical space was the easiest way to off balance and then maintain discomfort as both parties had social obligations to one another to apologize and ensure the other party was whole after the fact.   
  
It didn’t take long, and events played out exactly as intended. The quick jolt of her body against his as he deliberately stumbled into her, the sound of her heels clattering, her bare flesh smacking the ground, was pleasant. Tom turned around, his face schooled into mortified shock.

“I am so incredibly sorry for that Miss… Granger?” He let the name float like a question in the air, hands outstretched to lift her off the ground.

  
Her hand was fisted into her mane of curly hair at the back of her head, and Tom noted that she’d been able to protect her skull in time, as people instinctively did. Everything about her was shades of tan and brown, like mud, and more interesting for how dull she usually made herself. Even in her finery, it was as if she was still wearing a bag instead of a dress. It had been in the slouch of her shoulders, the way she made no effort to control her gait into something more suited to heels. He wondered if she contemplated how to make herself the least presentable on a daily basis, including her sloppy mannerisms.

The black dress now looked disheveled around her shoulders, the garish necklace she wore hanging pendulously between the tops of her lightly freckled breasts, and Tom decided he rather liked making such an organized person, albeit a frumpy one, a mess.

Well, he’d always known that. But the best part of having an appetite for unraveling people at the seams was that hunger and scarcity were the nonpareil spices for a meal. It’d been some time since he’d been able to get under the skin of anyone worth making an effort for. Severus was his creature, and he didn’t shit where he ate, especially when he was also a half-nobly born man, though from a more minor house than Tom. Mr. Snape was a distorted mirror; he’d never been able to get over that his mother had made a choice to be with a drunk, trailer-trash abuser when she could have married well. He still had his uses, despite his neurosis. Lucius, his son, and a handful of the other men who orbited Gellert had long since ceased being amusing, their needs and wants more similar to animals than Tom’s. Of course there was Gellert, but he fell into the same category as Severus.

“Oh! Um, it’s fine.” Her hands were petite, the nails untouched by polish with the cuticles slightly grown over the nail. Bending over further, he reached a hand around to support her back and haul her up bodily.   
  
“Bloody hell, no! The dress…” Her fingers were gripping the front slit of the black which had torn. Fortuitous.

“This is entirely my fault. I will replace the dress of course. And I’ll commandeer a sewing kit from Lady Malfoy. Please, allow me?” He offered his arm out to her, releasing her stabilized body. She started to demure, her voice softly rising along with a hint of pink on her cheeks. And, she hadn’t asked his name. Which meant she knew him, if only his face, not necessarily his accomplishments.

Giving her a smile he used on clients, he was pleased to see she was probably attracted to him. He dropped his proffered arm to text one of the Malfoy butlers he had on payroll, that was also on triple payroll to report his requests to the Malfoys. Tenuous beginnings of a plan were forming in his mind.

“It’s all right, really, I’ll just-” She turned to leave, looking about the hall to begin making her escape.

“Nonsense, why I know just the place where we can take care of this wardrobe mishap.”

In a stroke of luck the butler directed him via text to the main library where a sewing kit would be waiting. He held out his arm again, expectantly. She examined it, still flushed and her protests more of a mumble this time. 

It was important for her to take what was offered. The decision she made here was a false one; she was coming to the room with him. But it always benefited him to give others as many choices as was affordable, so that when he actually needed cooperation, he could demand it. 

Finally, after both their bodies had stilled, the tense silence of Tom seeping into the girl and rendering her quiet, her fingers rested carefully on his arm. He graced her with another smile, practiced and pleased.

“You know the Malfoys?” She found her voice as they made their way down a hall that took them away from the party. As French doors were opened and closed between them, the drone of conversation subsumed into a murmur behind.

“Yes, Lucius works closely with _Ouroboros_. The man is as odious as his son, who occupies a role as junior council at the company.” Throwing it out there that he found the Malfoys to be sub par wasn't risky. Tom assumed that Draco had made efforts to malign the woman in school, and Lucius was as corrupt as they came. All things that would trigger spasms of integrous protestations in a person like Hermione, if she were in the presence of a trusted friend.

Still, she said nothing to confirm or deny what she thought of the Malfoys or Tom's assessment of them.

When they reached the library her eyes went wide with something bordering on lust.

She dropped open the seam of her ripped dress and perused the titles of the books, her fingers hovering reverently over each spine. Tom moved to the desk where a small plastic container stood out of place on the mahogany next to a set of quills, letterheads and wax for seals. The orphanage had so very few nice clothes, the majority of what the children wore were gleaned from donations. Tom naturally became an expert in which clothing was quality and the maintenance as well as alteration of it. 

As he opened the kit and assessed what was available for use, he thought about his options, what the bigger picture could be. He wasn't sure how this would play out, nor exactly what tract he should take.

Tentatively, this Hermione would be an option for him to have as a temporary partner. But he knew she wouldn’t likely agree willingly. That didn’t mean he couldn’t offer her a deal, and force her to take it. People mostly wanted what they wanted, without a care for the terms if they could be promised a veneer of achieving their goals without harming others. Even though it was patently true that most things were a zero-sum game. Still, many people believed what they were told because they wanted to, because it was easy. Maybe a few assumed that the story was worse than what they were told, but an even fewer were capable of measuring the depth of others, the possible depravities, and having the determination to know if the human in front of them would take those abuses to the furthest extent. It might take this woman some time to see the worst of Tom, but eventually she would know the scope of his unethical dealings.

He knew from the profile he’d read that she believed the ends did not justify the means, but there were ways around this. Ultimately he wanted her compliance with his hard limits in life; any partner of his would defer to him in his sphere of influence and as he would theirs, if they were worth respecting for their accomplishments. If she wanted to pursue her work, he’d enable her with money and influence. 

Despite his noble title, none of his peers would marry their daughter to a man with one foot in their society and another in the world they sought to rob and save in the same breath. It left him in a predicament where he would have to find a partner that was close to as intelligent and hardworking as him. Someone that he could use in a similar manner to the wives of men like Lucius. Since there would be nothing as bland and useless as love between this nameless person who he would have to share a portion of his life with, the spaces had to be filled with at least some amount of mutual respect. This was where she fit.

He'd met people like, but not exactly as competent as Hermione Granger; she had the right combination of qualifications and aptitude. Top of her class and a part of a veritable buffet of clubs during University. If she had been from an old family of longstanding tradition and impeccable bloodline, and it had been fifty years past, she would have been betrothed by her teens. But still, she was a believer in the greater good. It was clear from what he had on paper that morally, she was as straight and narrow as they came. He didn't have to talk with her to see that her stubborn nature regarding how she dressed was only the tip of the iceberg when it came to how little bend she would have for things she found to be ‘wrong’.

Which begged the question as to why she was here, alone. She who had never shown up to one of these types of parties as long as he'd been at _Ouroboros_.  

He could hazard a guess that it related to his current project. There were topical reasons he had picked the valley where the Thestral flower lay. He had done the research and found there would be tax benefits given in favor of alternative land. But the views and the future planning of the area would make the valley where the flowers were more valuable as time went on. It was the pick of the litter and its development set the stage for _Ouroboros_ to make the area a viable center for high income residents and the types of commerce they enjoyed.

“Ms. Granger?” she startled, her arms moving to hug herself as she whipped around to look at him, as if she'd forgotten she was here and what their purpose was. He gave her as gentle a smirk as he could manage and patted a comfortable armchair in askance. She eyed it, and him as he pulled up a footstool, needle and and thread in hand.

“Well?” He continued. Like a gangly fawn, she walked over slowly on her heels, the wideness of her gait stretching open the front of the dress. She didn’t realize how much of the inside of her thighs she was showing him, all innocent hesitance.

Watching her was making her tension worse, and he still had one more text to send. Biting down on the needle, he told the other butler, the one who the Malfoys did not know was on his payroll, to inform him when Draco or Lucius inevitably made their way to the library. These little games they played were a delight.   
  
“ _You_ know how to sew?” Her emphasis on his name told him she knew who he was, or at least that his ability here was incongruent with his image. She plopped down heavily onto the chair.

“Yes, _I_ know how to sew.” Methodically he pinched the seam and hiked up the top of the dress over her legs, leaving them bare down to her heels. He needed to reach underneath the fabric where the thread had ripped. She gasped and tried to shove the fabric back down again, digging in her shoes in order to stand. His hands clamped down on her thighs, needle perilously close to her skin.  

“The seam is on the underside.” Leaning closer to her, he pressed his hands down more firmly. Her eyes were wide with surprise and indignation. Her jaw worked for a moment, nothing coming out as he grazed his fingers in a gentle caress alongside the outside of her left leg as if in an accidental manner.   
  
“Oh- Okay.” The shock hadn’t bled from her expression, but she stopped struggling and let him focus his attention to the area near the apex of her thighs. Resting his hands over them, he began stitching, fingers nimble and precise.   
  
There was a moment, where he considered the long term repercussions of what he was about to do. Truthfully, there were several junctures in time where he had done so, but none stretched out so long and downright palatably as this one. First, to put her off balance. Then to set the bait, drawing her moral obligations to the fore. Finally, close the noose tight around her neck and watch the struggle bleed out from her taut body, rendering her not exactly pliant, but a quiet, simmering rage that begged to be provoked at a later date.   
  
“So tell me, what brings Dumbledore’s solicitor here all on her lonesome? Come to plumb the depths of our profligacy, or simply to find out how your cameras in the _Forbidden Forest_ ended up destroyed this weekend?” His voice oh so casual, he doubled back the stitch to meet the thread hanging loose underneath, tying the two together and completing his work as he finished his sentence. Quickly, he shoved the needle into the chair to prevent it from unwantedly stabbing her before he’d gotten the chance to see her face scrunch up deliberately from any pain he wished to inflict.

Before she opened her mouth, one of her legs came up, her intention to possibly kick or knee him square in the chest. From the vehemence of her reaction, he could extrapolate that she hadn’t known the cameras had been ‘accidentally’ mowed over by an enthusiastic caretaker in the pay of a shell company belonging to a one Tom Riddle. No matter.

Like a viper, he lunged forward, his leg pushing her rising one to the side, hands slamming down on top of the chair as he stood caging her body. He loomed over her, pinning her to the chair effectively by standing between her spread legs. She hissed up at him then, unafraid.   
  
“Don’t think I don’t know who you are Tom Riddle. I’m here because I wanted to find out what soulless cretin would choose to develop land that contained an at-risk plant. Now that I’m aware, I’ll be leaving.” She didn’t try to push him off, instead leaning back languidly with the expectation that he would make way for her. It pulled a deceptively gentle smirk to the surface of his face, his little brown mousey who’d looked for a tasty morsel of information and had instead acquired herself a predator.

“You know, usually when I want to know something, I pay for it. I don’t show up uninvited to my enemy’s home and presume that it will be handed over to me.” Invading her personal space, he tugged at an errant lock of hair that had fallen over her cheek. Bella’s hair was loose black ringlets, limp and coiled when it lay on sweat soaked skin. He was sure Hermione’s hair, if he found the opportunity, would never be as vulgar as to give in so easily. Yes, he’d have to bind it, hogtie her frizzy mane to her legs. And still, it wouldn’t stop the loose curls from bouncing in time with her pert breasts if he had her in front of a mirror. 

Yes, he was spoiling for conflict of the impertinent solicitor variety.  

“I have an invitation-” She protested indignantly.

“Dumbledore has an invitation. You, on the other hand, have poor impulse control. But, no need to fret. You’re here about the flowers? I’ll offer you them. The state can keep its precious public land and I’ll build elsewhere. Isn’t that what you really want?” It wasn’t. Tom suspected that as pragmatic as Hermione identified herself to be, she’d balk at a deal that involved personal sacrifice as well as the disconcerting challenge of offering intimacy for a material outcome, regardless that it would get the job done. People, generally the ‘brave’ and self righteous wanted their victories on their terms, instead of results.

“I- You don’t- Wait, why? You have no reason, so why just hand it over?” She looked briefly confused before her eyebrows furrowed and her face settled into a glower of mistrust.

“Do you know that Oxford has many clubs, but the most exclusive of all is Slytherin? I have ambitions, Mrs. Granger.” It’s said that in Slytherin, you make your real friends. _Those cunning folk use any means to achieve their ends._ But Tom knew it was a darling rhyme that attempted to soften the notion that Slytherin was beyond a cutthroat bloodbath of intrigue and politics. If Hermione were at all knowledgeable, Slytherin secrets or no, she’d be aware of that too. Ruthless didn’t come close to describing the antipathy for weakness those who joined the club possessed, and how interactions were calculated down to the most minute value that could be extracted from them.

“I don’t see how your _ambitions_ intersect with giving up the land. You Slytherins are always going on about ROI and benchmarking each other. The word 'free' has little to do with your ways of getting ahead.” She crossed her arms defensively but made no move to dislodge him. Settling back down onto the footrest, he let his hands blanket themselves over the arms of the chair, continuing to bracket her form. With his knees widening her legs open, she looked stunningly vulnerable and powerful at the same time. Her lack of confoundment at the exposure, coupled with her flashing bronze eyes made him want to smack the color pink into her cheeks while she glared murder at him.

“That’s where you’re half wrong. I’m not giving you the land; I intend to get a return on my investment, as you say my kind are so fond of. I’m offering it, for a price.” Tom’s phone buzzed in his suit pocket, the signal that he had mere minutes before a Malfoy, likely Draco, barged in.   
  
“I have nothing you want. I couldn’t possibly.” Snorting in the most unladylike manner, which was likely intentional, Tom’s smirk turned emphatically feral.

“In less than two minutes your favorite former classmate, who would love to do unspeakable things to you in retribution for some pointless slight, but will settle for laying waste to your career, is going to walk through that door. Blond, pointy, and sneering, if it rings any bells. You’re going to pretend, and pretend well, to be my partner of three months, and my date this evening. We’ve been keeping it quiet, due to the antagonistic nature of our respective jobs, _dearest_ . You’ll be _in flagrante delicto_ when he arrives, and after we terrorize him into leaving, we’ll discuss the ongoing nature of our new arrangement and what I expect from you going forward.”   
  
“You _bloody-”_ Her hair positively frizzled with anger, her hands rising away from her chest like claws. She latched onto his lapels and he grinned maniacally before reaching down between her legs as his other hand lashed out to grasp her jaw. His fingers closed around the delicate angle of her face first and he gripped her tight, pinching so hard her lips pursed into a pink pucker.   
  
“Well darling, if you want to discuss expectations in the short time we have, I can make it plain.” His other digits glanced over the worn cotton of her knickers, seeking out the slight indent of her slit before he jabbed a forefinger into where her entrance was and pressed down on the meat of her between that and his thumb, feeling the almost cartilaginous length of her bundle of nerves nestled amongst the flesh.

Her unrefined little ‘ _mmph’_ when he wrenched her clit outward and thumbed it between his fingers wasn’t something he wanted Draco to hear. Even if it was only an agreement, the foul-mouthed manchild could covet his new toy from a great distance as far as he was concerned.

Hermione was frozen with inaction at his encroachment of her most private parts, which was just as well. Keeping his hand attached to her face, he moved his other to wet his fingers in his mouth before darting over the slouched top of her dress and catching a rigid nipple that was hovering just below the neckline of the fabric. She made another small sound when he twisted it wetly between his fingers, before exploding into action, her hands blindly flailing up to grasp at his throat and chin, knocking his arm away from her face and chest.

“Mangy _fucking_ chav. Don’t you ever touch me again! I’ll have you up on charges so fast you’ll have torsion in your bollocks, you daft _maggot._ ” Tom allowed himself be shoved back by her wickedly fast push, letting out a chortle of satisfaction.

“Tosh, Hermione. Use your head, you utter _cow_ ,” he pitched his voice like a pleased caress, and relaxed further back onto his hands. He wondered if she could hear the telltale click of men’s dress shoes coming closer from outside the library, about thirty seconds from opening the door.

“When Draco walks in here, you’ll agree to what I’m offering or I’ll tell him all about how I caught you in here, spying, perhaps even stealing books like the minger you are. The great white idiot will believe me, knowing your penchant for outdoing him in school and how your ability left him no space with which to compete _but_ for his esteemed heritage,” he gestured at the mountainous shelves and their dusty contents around him. “Which he will consider you to be attempting to rob him of that too, an infringement that he’ll be unable to bear. Then I’ll make sure your faux pas in coming here tonight without an invitation, completely un-sanctioned by _Phoenix,_ is well known. They’ll denounce you and a few months later, after a series of unfortunate setbacks in court, including disbarment for committing a crime, you lose your job. After that, I’ll make sure no one hires you. Not even to scrub their floors. You have ten seconds Hermione.” His words sibilant, cutting, she visibly wilted under the barrage of certitude. Underneath, there still lurked outrage and defiance; it snapped in her eyes and crackled in the jerky movements of her clenching fists. The blossoming, though perhaps incomplete, devastation on her face was ambrosia. Tom vowed that he’d break that fucking steel spine of hers into pieces and remake her; that unshakeable will, spitting defiance, even as she lay stripped of options before him, would know the perfect despair of losing when he was finished with her.

  
For now, she looked simply debauched, the dusky edge of an areola peeking out with a streak of saliva from Tom was a badge upon her breast. Her face flushed with shame, legs spread wide to him.

The double doors swung open dramatically, Draco’s toothy leer shining brilliantly. Tom smiled back, the sun to a pale and waxen moon.

 “Draco. So glad you could join us."

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gown: https://www.shopbop.com/off-shoulder-crepe-gown-feathers/vp/v=1/1568361186.htm?folderID=13374&fm=other-shopbysize-viewall&os=false&colorId=12867


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